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Over at Small Dead Animals, a favourite hangout of the most rabid of right-wingers, there are howls for the heads of those in the Conservative war room responsible for the pooping puffin.

Kate McMillan, SDA's headmistress, gets it started with this post:

Conservative Web Presence Still Riddled With Childish Shots

The media are falling all over themselves in faux outrage over a cartoon puffin shown crapping on Stephane Dion's shoulder at the Conservative party website notaleader.ca. It's been yanked, with some lame excuse about an overzealous web designer.

You know, we tried to warn you idiots.

The Conservative official said the type of voter targeted by notaleader.ca at tends to be someone between 18 and 30, who has not yet developed a loyalty to one political brand or another.

“They are anti-establishment, libertarian, web- and tech-savvy, and politically incorrect,” said the Conservative adviser. “We set out to build a website that appeals to them.”

Just more evidence that…

“There exists a persistent misconception inside political/media circles that the political interweb is the domain of “tech savvy twenty-somethings”. The Conservative's website has, in all likelihood, been influenced by this ridiculous assumption and that means it's time to fire some of the high-priced help. If your web people haven't even a remedial understanding of their audience demographic, they have no business being involved in your communications strategy.”

Then the anonymous commenters jump in:

bryanr: Not very impressive, There are still a lot fence sitter voters out there. Leave the cheap theatrics to the Liberals.

Edward Teach: Well they've already committed the first cardinal sin of web design: Making the front page entirely out of Flash! When will people get it through their stupid heads? Flash is for animation ONLY, not wholesale web design and layout! If all you know is Flash, then you're NOT a web designer!

bryanr: i just sent off a mail to the party, Basically saying scap that crap stick to the facts, We don't need to make Dion look like a fool as he shoots himself in the foot all the time anyways. Lets not lose the momentum on tacky ads that the msm will have a field with. Remember the backlash on the chretien photo.

Rich: Someone needs to get control of this and fast!

Anyone in the CPC listening? This could be a BIG negative.

molarmauler: I'm pissed.

An excellent policy announcement ruined by puffin shit. I'd be firing people.

Garry: When a Radio-Canada guy asked the PM about the birdshi* he just couldn't resist bringing up the Chretien facial distortion from '93 and some added commentary to boot. Harper looked sincere apologizing (twice).

bryanr: the star & GM are having a field day with this, Comments section are not good (although they never are anyways) Good part Week 1 could & should lose traction when we get into the meat of the campaign.

And a Yes somebody should be canned for this.

Calgary Junkie; bryanr is right, Dion already does a great job of looking foolish. So let's back off of that theme somewhat.

The last thing we want is for “poor picked on” Dion to get any sympathy from anywhere. Plus, there is the possibility that the Liberal base will get energized, and motivated to work harder to fight that “bully” Harper.

Dumb, dumb, dumb.

ConservativeKingston: You guys would do far better if you stopped whining about how the MSM is treating this issue, and recognize that YOU CAN DO F*CK ALL ABOUT IT. The issue is out there, and it's entirely of the CPC's making. Whoever approved this “ad” needs a kick in the ass, because they should have bloody well known this type of reaction was going to happen. This was such a childish, pointless ad anyway.

Who's running the show on this one?

Stephen Harper is in Winnipeg this morning but, just like they were yesterday, his war room operatives back in Ottawa were up early releasing a new series of Dion attack ads.

The attack ads were unveiled by Heritage Minister Josee Verner and Conservative candidate Lisa Raitt, who is running, not without some controversy, against Liberal Garth Turner in the southern Ontario riding of Halton. The new ads — which the Conservatives describe as “a public information campaign” say that Dion will eliminate the $100-a-month subsidy paid to the parents of young children.

On Monday, the Liberal campaign denied that they had any plans to eliminate that payment.

But the Tories say the Liberal protests are not credible, that Dion has a hidden agenda when it comes to the subsidy program, known as the Universal Child Care Benefit.

The Conservatives point to this interview published in the Oct. 21, 2006 edition of National Post. Dion is responding to questions from an unnamed interviewer:

Post: What social program would be your top priority?

Dion: Many, but since you have asked for only one, I will play the game: it is the Child Tax Benefit, and increasing it, as I have already discussed. The rate of child poverty in this country is a disgrace and I will not tolerate it.

Post: Would you cancel the Tory daycare plan? What would you replace it with?

Dion: Yes. The Dryden plan was much better. We need child care facilities to provide Canadian parents with real choice. It's a matter of social justice, but also of sound economics: child care facilities are a good way to encourage flexibility and mobility of our workforce, at a time when, often, two parents are working outside the home.

The Conservatives, in the last campaign, promised to set aside $250-million which businesses and other institutions could tap into to build new daycare spaces. The Tories said that initiative would create 125,000 daycare spaces. In fact, that program was a flop and created no spaces.

Instead, the Conservatives transferred that money to the provinces.

Technorati Tags: elections

Brett Favre's debut with the New York Jets was (quite rightly, says this NFL fan) the big news in The Big Apple today but, there was little Canada, still hanging on to a spot on the home page of the online edition of the New York Times at 7 pm:

Mr. Harper is not charismatic and often appears irritated, particularly when he is challenged. But his personal approval ratings in pre-election polls are significantly higher than those of Stéphane Dion, the Liberal leader. Mr. Harper was favored as potentially “the best prime minister” by 50 percent, compared with 20 percent for Mr. Dion.

Mr. Dion, an accomplished academic, is entering his first election as leader. He speaks English awkwardly, and even speaking in French, his first language, Mr. Dion at a podium can sound as if he is still lecturing dryly on public administration and political science at the Université de Montréal.

The most striking negative prompting Mr. Harper’s decision is a deteriorating economy. Although high oil and commodity prices have so far prevented a significant slowdown, recent economic data suggests that Canada is now being dragged down by the problems of the American economy. [Read the rest]

The mighty BBC actually sent out an alert early this morning, letting its subscribers know that Obama vs McCain isn't the only high-profile political fight gripping North American polticos. We've got Harper vs Dion vs Duceppe vs Layton vs May and that was good enough to keep news about the Canadian election high up on BBC's site early this evening but the version up on their site at 7 pm Ottawa time noted only quoted the Harper handout at Rideau Hall and did not quote any other political leader, even though those leaders spoke a good eight hours ago:

Holding the election this year breaks Mr Harper's own fixed-date election law, something he had said was necessary to prevent prime ministers calling elections when polls indicated they were in a favourable position.

Mr Harper has made it clear he is running on economic issues and criticised the Liberals' plan to tax greenhouse gas polluters while cutting other taxes.

“Between now and October 14, Canadians will choose a government to look out for their interests at a time of global economic trouble,” Mr Harper said in a statement.

“They will choose between direction or uncertainty; between common sense or risky experiments; between steadiness or recklessness.”

The opposition leaders are expected to make their own addresses later on Sunday. [Read more]

News that Canada was in election mode also made The Times of India, The Christian Science Monitor, and, notably, Al Jazeera.

Technorati Tags: elections, journalism

I was a National Post “day oner” — still have the leather jacket we all got when our first paper rolled off the presses on Oct. 26, 1998. My editor, then, was one Mr. John Ivison, who now sits kiddie corner to me here in Ottawa where he's famous for writing a column on national politics.

I'm pleased to point out that some or most of what you'll read here is also being cross-posted to the Post's most excellent “Full Comment” section. If you haven't seen the space, check it out. That's the online hangout of Jonathan Kay and most of the Post's editorial board as well as stars of the Post's commentariat including David Frum and Conrad Black.

Technorati Tags: journalism, blogs

On his first full day of campaigning in 2005, Stephen Harper was at the Chateau Frontenac in Quebec City with several of his Quebec City area candidates behind him. Asked to introduce some of his candidates — which included future cabinet ministers Josée Verner and Maxime Bernier — Harper told us to get that information from his staff. That event did not go well.

Harper is in Quebec City again, to start this campaign. But this time, he introduced each candidate, which now includes several MPs from the Quebec City region.

Technorati Tags: conservatives, elections

Liberal leader Stéphane Dion made his campaign-opening statement in the House of Commons foyer, the same spot that then-opposition leader Stephen Harper opened the last general election campaign.

For his statement, Dion was accompanied by his wife Janine Krieber. Krieber did not say anything but she and Dion grabbed hands and smiled at each other when I asked Dion about the “family man” ads the Conservatives have been airing in the last week. The Conservatives seemed to stress Harper's status as a family man and I asked both men this morning about that: For Harper, why he thought it was important for voters to consider his “family man” status as they cast their votes and, for Dion, if he thought that voters ought to consider that as they cast a ballot.

Harper said his advisors suggested that Canadians had not seen him in that light and so they decided to present that particular view of him. Dion said he believed that there ought to be separation, so far as media attention goes, between someone's private life and public life but that, he, too, is a family man. Harper has a wife, two children and lots of cats. Dion has a wife, a child, and a dog.

Political strategists say that the Conservatives initially positioned Harper's softer side in order to being winning over female voters. That's a demographic that has historically been lukewarm to Harper and the Conservatives.

Technorati Tags: elections, stephane dion, stephen harper

Prime Minister Stephen Harper paid a visit to his war room after leaving his meeting with Governor General Michaëlle Jean this morning at Rideau Hall and before his arrival at Ottawa's airport for a flight to Quebec City. The Conservative war room — dubbed the 'fear factory' by some wags in Ottawa — sprawls across the entire second floor of an office building in an industrial park in Ottawa's east end. About 100 people go to work there every day. The facility is a high-tech affair with IP-based telephones and a fully-functioning TV studio.

Harper paid a visit to these folks to pump his troops up as he and they head into battle for the Oct 14 vote.

The Conservatives plan to use its war room as their national communication hub. I'll be out there at 6 am Ottawa time Monday morning for a press conference with two (as yet unnamed) ministers. We've been told to expect a lot of bright-and-early pressers from their war room as the Conservatives try to set the day's agenda by being first with the news. Harper is spending the night in Vancouver and, as a result, he will show up a little later in the day in the eastern Canadian mediascape.

Technorati Tags: conservatives, elections, stephen harper

Sandra Buckler is back in the public eye. Buckler retired as the prime minister's director of communications in midsummer and has kept a pretty low profile ever since. But today she's back in the thick of things as part of the “spinner” team for the Conservatives. Buckler was a panelist on CTV Newsnet. She was appearing from Ottawa next to former Liberal cabinet minister Brian Tobin.

Buckler got her job as the top communications advisor to the prime minister shortly Stephen Harper took office back in 2006. Many in Ottawa believe she was tapped for that position because of her effectiveness as a spinner in the 2005-06 campaign. Buckler's style during that campaign was to refuse to rise to the bait — often offered up rather aggressively by Liberal Susan Murray -and maintain a pleasant demeanour while focusing like a laser beam on the day's message.

Even former prime minister Brian Mulroney noticed how effective she was. Mulroney, who spent most of the winter campaign at his home in Florida, phoned up the Conservative war room in mid-campaign to personally congratulate Buckler on the job she was doing. For Buckler, who was a big fan of Mulroney, it was one of her personal highlights of the campaign.

Technorati Tags: conservatives, elections

Just out from the PMO:
—– Original Message —–
From: Gallery-Tribune <pressres2@parl.gc.ca>
Sent: Fri Sep 05 16:23:46 2008
Subject: OTTAWA – ONTARIO / SEPT. 07 / 07 SEPT. / 8:05